Homeland Security committee member things freedom of the press in the U.S. is growing tiresome

What do President Barack Obama (D) and Rep. Peter King (R- N.Y.) have in common? They are none too happy about the sources and the journalists involved in the publication of secrets on the NSA snooping on Americans.

Actually, if they willing knew that this was classified information, I think action should be taken, especially on something of this magnitude. I know that the whole issue of leaks has been gone into over the last month. I think something on this magnitude, there is an obligation, both moral but also legal, I believe, against a reporter disclosing something which would so severely compromise national security.

President Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder has reportedly carried out campaigns to spy on a Fox News reporter who was involved in the publication of leaked intelligence details on North Korea. In that case, AG Holder signed early documents suggesting that the journalist -- James Rosen -- was considered a "co-conspirator" to the leaker and could face criminal charges. The effort to charge the journalists was ultimately dropped as the investigation proceeded, but drew substantial criticism.

The Obama administration has charged more than twice as many whistleblowers with Espionage Act (18 U.S.C. § 792) offenses as all the previous administrations before him (since the Act was passed in 1917) combined. But he's only been able to do that thanks to support of the practices by members of Congress, including House Republicans like Rep. King.

II. FBI Works Towards Charging Whistleblower

News of the long rumoredNSA spying -- funded by Barack Obama's "big data" spending program -- broke last week. Details of two programs -- a narrow, more aggressive program dubbed PRISM and a broad, ubiquitous unnamed phone records seizure program leaked. According to the Obama administration the PRISM effort involved the seizure of email and chat records, but was meant to target suspected terrorists -- most foreigners -- and was limited to a small number of individuals.

By contrast the phone records seizure tracked the majority of U.S. citizens -- including those who never communicated with a foreigner and never were suspected of committing a crime. The Obama administration sought to downplay this spying saying it was "only metadata". However, that "metadata" contained records of who you talked to and when, plus tracked the locations of citizens on a daily basis.

Both programs were authorized under the Oct. 2001 USA PATRIOT (Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism) Act.

The FBI is drafting chargers against the leaker, and possibly journalists.
[Image Source: Alamy]

On Sunday, the leaker outed himself as Edward Snowden, a former contractor for the NSA who worked at Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corp (BAH). Rep. King was among the first to call on him to be charged. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) is rumored be currently drafting up those charges. Mr. Snowden is rumored to be holed up at a safe house in Hong Kong.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

and you said you couldn't find anything in the Constitution... you must be blind, words confuse you or you didn't even read the thing. Read the line "but upon probable cause"... do you understand the concept? Let me translate for you: "a reasonable amount of suspicion, supported by circumstances sufficiently strong to justify a prudent and cautious person's belief that certain facts are probably true". Hopefully that clears it up for you.

As for the Patriot Act granting this power, no it does not. the Patriot act was limited, by law thanks to the Constitution, to probable cause. Even Bush limited himself to probable cause targeting individuals and not spying on everyone. But of course you're fearful, I can tell by your rational. You're afraid of terrorism even-though you have a much bigger change of being struck by lightening. I can't really expect you to understand the words and their meaning(s) when your thought patterns are made irrational with fear.

Now you go on to say that there is no Conspiracy to take away your rights... except your 4th Amendment right is clearly being taken away (more than that one but I don't feel like straying too far from the topic)???

And as for taking your guns away... well... I suppose that depends what gun you own eh? Because clearly the Government is going after the AR-15 (not an assault rifle) as well as "Assault Rifles". So yes there is a Conspiracy to take your guns away if you own certain types of guns. This is pretty self evident but keep parroting what Obama has "said" rather than what he has "done". I mean people always do what they say eh? *rolls eyes*

Now you end by stating that you're more concerned with Corporate power and the influence of money on politics... yet ignore exactly WHY you're being spied on which is the result of the potential of some people to attack the United States which is the result of Foreign Interventions and the slaughter if innocent people by the US Military which is done in the name of Corporate Power and Interests (as well as Geo-political interests which are mostly entirely economics driven and tied to Corporate interests).

quote: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Please go back to reread the leaked documents. It says nothing about PII(personally identifiable information). It wants the phone numbers and call location/history. Of course this data would be useless to monitor a population. It is useful when you are investigating an individual.

Phone numbers and history by itself cannot identify a person. This data is useless in court but it is useful to get leads in solving an investigation.

Radical, first off I'm not your buddy. I don't know you and based on your response, I don't think I would like to get to know you.

But to the point, I understand the constitution and from a strict perspective, there is nothing in the words that you printed nor the ones on the parchment itself that lead me to believe that the government violated your rights. There was no search of your property. You don't own your cell phone transaction records anymore than YOU own the record or the toothpicks you purchased as WalMart. Your person was no where near those records and neither was your property. You left a digital fingerprint like the fingerprints you leave on the cigarette machine. You left them behind and the government copied them down in case a crime is reported that can be linked to that evidence. You see? That was my point. If you love the constitution so much, you should really try to understand what it says and means.

now I also see that there is interpretation that comes on top of the hallowed words, which helps make the constitution more elastic to meet requirements of modern times. So if you feel that you would like to interpret the extent of your property to include the records of transactions you leave behind...then I guess you are right to be outraged at the breach of your constitutional rights...but you didn't make that point and I don't think you are currently sitting on a federal court empowered to make those types of interpretations.

Next, the Patriot Act -- You really should read the thing, it's awful and i think designed to thwart a normal citizen from getting through the details. It's basically and extension and broadening of several existing tools like FISA and other to allow for easier access to data by the feds. You again go back to the constitution like that will fix everything in the law. If the law is not constitutional, then someone needs to take a case to court and have the courts rule on the legality (constitutionality) of the legislation. In this case. it's been challenged several times and parts of it have been called unconstitionally vague, but not the parts you would think and in the end it's still there.

As to my fears, personally, I'm not afraid of terrorism, no more than I'm afraid of lighting, hurricanes or big tornadoes...but I don't live in areas that have frequent association with those events, so that's not surprising. But...I do think that the US government does have cause to be concerned with terrorism and I don't fault people that are wary of terrorist attacks...But that's off subject again...

On the point of guns, I do think that there are a number of folks that want to limit the types of firearms that produced and sold in the country and I don't like that. I'm a gun owner and I like my sporting guns and I enjoy shooting for sport. I also see that there are folks out there that like to hunt and guns are a big part of that practice. I just can't think of a single gun right that Obama has taken away from me. I'm trying hard, but please correct me if I missed one. I think if anything guns laws have become more relaxed under the current administration (federally). I'm not 100% sure on this point, but please give me some examples if you have them.

I do like the whole what Obama says versus what he's done argument. I think I heard some NRA nut talking about the tricky Obama in his first term lulling the masses into thinking that he wasn't going to take there guns only as a plan to really get them in his second term. Talk about conspiracy nuts...and eyes rolling....facts are facts, if you have them, use them.

on your last point, you again head out into conspiracy land...I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'm not saying your right, I'm just saying that you should spend less time listening to late night talk radio. anyway corporatism is a whole topic unto itself.

""The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

and you said you couldn't find anything in the Constitution... you must be blind, words confuse you or you didn't even read the thing. "

I think words confuse you. Where in there does it say the phone company can't pass on your call data if ordered by a Judge? (don't be surprised to see that they can in your next contract either)Is your call data which was done on THEIR network, your home, your effects, your papers? It could easily be argued they are not. Your footprints aren't your "houses, papers, and effects"

I personally think the NSA could track terrorist better and not require all this information but to claim it’s a violation of the 4th Amendments seems to be reaching, at least in its current wording.

""The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

and you said you couldn't find anything in the Constitution... you must be blind, words confuse you or you didn't even read the thing. "

I think words confuse you. Where in there does it say the phone company can't pass on your call data if ordered by a Judge? (don't be surprised to see that they can in your next contract either)Is your call data which was done on THEIR network, your home, your effects, your papers? It could easily be argued they are not. Your footprints aren't your "houses, papers, and effects"

I personally think the NSA could track terrorist better and not require all this information but to claim it’s a violation of the 4th Amendments seems to be reaching, at least in its current wording.